


Dos Fantasías

by WildwingSuz



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-19
Updated: 2015-04-19
Packaged: 2018-03-24 20:40:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3783655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WildwingSuz/pseuds/WildwingSuz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While working on a case the sexual tension between them becomes nearly unbearable, and Mulder and Scully do what they do best.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dos Fantasías

**Author's Note:**

> I originally started this one as a regular casefile, but I hadn’t written smut in a while so I decided to find a way to add it in. I thought about just having them be together and going at it every chance they got, but personally I like this better. If you don’t care to read about fantasizing and masturbation you might want to skip this one, but you’ll be missing some mighty fine smut IMHO.
> 
> Spoilers: little for early Season 7, Millennium and Theef in particular. Takes place shortly after Chimera.
> 
> Thanks so much to Leah and Sandi, who gave it an eyeball read and let me know it worked.

Dos Fantasías  
Rated NC-17   
By Suzanne L. Feld

“Adrian Peregrine? God, Mulder, what teenaged girl in America didn’t have a crush on him in the late ‘70s?” Scully said, flipping through the few pages in the file. “He guest-starred on The Partridge Family, The Brady Bunch, Emergency!, and Starsky and Hutch among others, had small parts in a lot of movies, you name it. And his albums sold millions to the pre-pubescent girls like me and Missy at the time.”

“My tenth-grade girlfriend had his pictures all over her bedroom walls, him and Donny Osmond, that’s how I know who he was,” her partner said, slowing for a curve with a sign that warned to take it at twenty-five. With good reason, he saw, since it was raining and the dropoff was a good sixty degrees on the right side of the narrow two-lane road. “Wouldn’t recognize him now, though, would you?”

She studied the picture at the front of the file. The Adrian Peregrine she vaguely remembered had once been a pretty teenage boy with thick wavy blonde hair that fell to his shoulders, freckles, wide guileless green eyes, and a slender androgynous build. Scully knew that those boys were picked for their very lack of masculinity which made them less threatening to both the target-age girls and their parents, but Peregrine had matured into a very masculine adult male.

The professionally-taken photo she now gazed at showed a tall, ruggedly muscular construction worker posed next to a huge bulldozer, wearing an unbuttoned plaid shirt with the sleeves cut off, tight low-rider jeans and cowboy boots. But other than the overall feeling of the picture, which was carefully composed to make the man in it look very masculine, Scully didn’t find him appealing at all. Adrian had grown into a rather un-handsome man above the shoulders, with a plain, narrow face whose most noticeable feature was the weak, undershot jaw. He still had the blonde hair, now a few shades darker and not as thick although worn just as long, and sported a fluffy mustache that did nothing for his looks. Like so many of the androgynous child boy-stars he hadn’t grown into the promise of his looks; just the opposite had happened. He did have a good body, she noted, tightly muscular and bulging in all the right places ala Arnold Schwarzenegger, but she’d found over the last few years that she much preferred a leaner build in men. One certain man in particular, that was.

“I can still see that kid here, but he’s clearly not as handsome as he thinks he is,” she remarked. “Just the attitude of this picture tells me all I need to know.”

“The last few weeks he’d been bragging to his co-workers that he’s moving back to Hollywood for a bi-i-i-g comeback,” Mulder said as he walked the big car back up to the regular fifty-five mile per hour speed limit on the narrow road, not daring to go any faster due to the conditions. They’d been warned that it would likely be rainy, normal for early spring in the valley, and the weather hadn’t disappointed them so far. “So when he didn’t show up for work Monday morning they thought that was where he’d gone, but then his agent called the construction company looking for him as he’d been due at a photo shoot the previous Saturday but never made it. And that’s when we got called in.”

“Because of the lights in the sky on the Friday evening he disappeared,” Scully said, not masking the disdain in her voice.

“Because of the lights,” he replied in a neutral voice. “All of his co-workers saw them as they were leaving the site. They called to him and he didn’t reply, and his car was still there Monday morning when they returned.”

“And your buddy in the State Police assumed alien abduction and called you,” Scully said, not moderating her tone at all.

“Apparently. And here we are, in happy rainy Oregon.”

“Rainy—that’s a surprise in the Pacific Northwest.” A bit disappointed that she hadn’t gotten a rise out of him, Scully gave up for the moment. “Isn’t it a bit more likely—”

He held a hand up. “Can you wait until we at least get to the motel to give me your speech about why whatever I think isn’t the case?” he said in a clearly bored voice. “Or at least after we talk to the people who saw the lights?”

“Hmph.” Annoyed now, Scully sat back and crossed her arms, letting the case file slide to the floor of the rental car. She saw his glance over at it and said, “I’ll get it when we stop, Mulder, this car is so big I can’t reach it without taking off my seat belt—and on this road I’m not going to do that.”

He nodded—the ’98 Caprice they’d gotten at the rental car place was a true land barge, one of the last of the big old rolling Detroit iron beasts. Though a couple of years old it was meticulously clean and ran well, though she thought it announced “cop” just as much as any marked police car. “We should almost be there,” he remarked, slowing yet again as a new speed limit sign announced thirty-five. “Too bad it’s still light out, but we might get to see the alien craft after dark.”

Scully glanced over at him, wondering why he seemed to be so determined to piss her off. Did he really have no idea how he affected her—that was, when he wasn’t annoying the hell out of her?

Mulder, in the meantime, was wondering what had crawled up her ass and died. Jesus, she barely had the bare-bones facts and was already decrying his theories. Maybe she really did live just to prove him wrong—as if she ever had or would. Couldn’t she ever give him the benefit of the doubt? But then if she did, he mused, he might have a heart attack from utter shock. But it’d be worth it to have her give him mouth-to-mouth, he thought as he remembered doing that for her in the alien spacecraft in Antarctica. He’d never forget the feeling of those few times they had kissed—or what passed for it in their strange lives—and on top of that, he could also call up the sight of her naked body at will as it had looked before he’d wrapped it in the extra clothes he’d had with him. Even barely conscious and covered in green goo, their situation desperate, she had simultaneously turned him on and filled his heart with love for her, though right now the recollection of her bare body was more intriguing… so slender, yet with nicely sized boobs that had large soft nipples and that taut little belly above dark red curls…

In a very short time they saw the sign welcoming them to Larkspur, Oregon, pop. 5,415. “We may as well check into the hotel then go talk to Stafford; the barracks are in Medford which is another ten minutes up the road,” Mulder said, turning into the parking lot of the Larkspur Motor Court which was maybe a hundred yards past the city limit sign. It was with some effort that he banished the image of her naked in his arms that he’d been musing about during the latter part of the drive, only this time in his imagination she was awake, aware, and responding to his caresses. He wondered what she would think if she knew that that was how he often kept himself occupied on long drives; that thought quickly cooled him down.

As they got out of the car Scully craned her neck at the sky and looked around; it was warm, muggy, and lightly drizzling but, she thought, not for long. Thickly swollen, pregnant storm clouds were moving in behind them. “Why don’t we wait until tomorrow to go to Medford?” she said as they walked the few feet to the motel office door. “It looks like we’re about to really get hit and it’s almost six anyway.”  
Mulder followed her gaze and saw a line of thick black clouds roiling over the mountains that they’d just come through. “I think you’re right,” he agreed as he held the door so that she entered the brightly lit office ahead of him “Hopefully it’ll cool things down.” In more ways than one, he thought as he remembered his musings on the drive.

As preferred they were able to get adjoining rooms with connecting doors. While lugging her suitcase, overnight case, and laptop bag into her room Scully wondered when Mulder might get up the cojones to use that door for more than bugging her; when was he finally going to make his move? The sexual tension between them was building to a point where she wasn’t sure she could continue to ignore it; ever since that sweet New Year’s Eve kiss a few months back she had known they were headed for the bedroom but it hadn’t happened yet. She didn’t feel comfortable starting things with him—what if she was wrong about the way he felt about her?—but was prepared for some serious and immediate responses should he eventually make up his mind that he wanted her.

No sooner had she set her suitcase on top of the rickety dresser than a knock came from the connecting door, which she had already unlocked. “C’mon in, Mulder,” she called, lifting the lid.

He walked in with the case file in one hand, leaving the doors open behind himself. He had removed his suit jacket and tie, white shirtsleeves rolled back to show his strong forearms. Tossing the case file on the bed he seated himself beside it and then arched back and stretched his arms up towards the ceiling, pulling his shirt out of his pants in the process. Her eyes zoomed to the strip of skin showing there, bisected by a dark line that she was dying to run her fingers down. “Thought you might want to finish reading that,” he said, gesturing at the manila folder. 

“Mulder, get off my bed,” she said as she kicked off her shoes. She’d already removed her blazer and hung it in the closet, and wanted to get the rest of her clothes taken care of. “And get out of here, I’m going to take a shower.”

“Oh you are, are you?” he said, getting up as thunder and lightening crashed outside the room, painting it briefly in shades of stark black and white. The promised storm had arrived. “Sure you wouldn’t rather wait?”

She backed away as he stalked towards her, eyeing him warily. “What are you doing, Mulder?”

“What I should have done years ago,” he said silkily as her back hit the wall next to the dresser. His arms went by either side of her head and he loomed over her, gazing into her eyes. She could only stare back at him wordlessly as he leaned down and then his mouth covered hers, hot hard and demanding—

“Scully? You decent?”

With a silent sigh of annoyance Scully blinked, shook her head, and turned away from her open suitcase. Was it good or bad when the real thing interrupted the fantasy? “Yeah, come on in.”

Mulder poked his head in through the partially open connecting door on her side. “Want to get some dinner? According to the sign next to the phone there’s a café just up the street, and it’s not raining yet.”

“Yeah, give me a minute to change,” she said, noting he was wearing a plain black t-shirt and jeans as he stepped into her room. As always, he looked incredibly, ruggedly handsome in the simple clothes—especially the tight jeans. She was still wearing her severe work pantsuit and was afraid that she looked like his social worker or parole officer or something.

“You look fine, let’s go,” he said as he closed the adjoining door to his room behind them and impatiently opened her room’s door to the outside. She noted that not only hadn’t the storm hit yet, it seemed to have mostly dissipated although it was warmer and still overcast. “I’m hungry.”

Oh, you’re hungry, she thought with annoyance as she followed him out the door of her room and made sure that she had her room key before locking it behind them. I’ve been hungry for years and you’re not doing a damn thing to ease my hunger, dammit!

***

As they ate Mulder noted that Scully seemed a bit on edge; he hadn’t thought his teasing in the car would annoy her quite that much. But she had been easily aggravated and touchy for the last few weeks—even more so than usual, he’d noticed. It had been, he realized with a sinking heart as he thought about it, since their kiss at New Year’s. A couple of months, then, not weeks. Had that kiss really been that dull, he wondered, or was she disappointed that he hadn’t taken it any further? But when he’d tried to tell her how he felt, on the day she’d told him that Diana had been killed, she had kissed him on the forehead and then walked away, so what was a guy to think? And if she really wanted their relationship to go that step further why wasn’t she letting him know? Or God knew was even better, jumping his bones? It wasn’t like his feelings for her were any kind of secret especially after their little sojourn in Kansas last year.

With a dint of will he shoved the thoughts away and settled down to his meal when it arrived; they’d skipped lunch in favor of getting on the road and he was starving. Scully, as she’d begun to lately, mostly picked at her meal and got the majority of it boxed up to go. He started to remark on it as they headed back to their rooms but decided against it; he didn’t need to get his head bitten off.

They parted at their doors with a murmured goodnight; although barely eight o’clock it was already getting dark. But as he went inside Mulder realized that he’d forgotten to turn on the air conditioner and it was stuffy in the small room. After turning it on he considered going for a run, but it was really too humid outside. However, there was a pool in the courtyard just a short walk from their doors, and he didn’t recall seeing a closed sign on it…

***

Scully heard his door close and went to the window, carefully moving aside the curtain to peer out. Her eyebrows hit her hairline as she saw Mulder walking away wearing what appeared to be a pair of swimming trunks and the same black t-shirt he’d been wearing earlier, a white hotel towel slung around his neck—and barefoot. That was what really caught her eye; Mulder rarely if ever went barefoot. As she watched he went over to the dark pool area and slipped silently inside the waist-height wooden fencing, where she lost sight of him in the shadows except for the faint gleam of the white towel around his neck. Then that, too, disappeared and she was left gazing into featureless darkness.

Though she was already dressed for bed Scully decided that this was as good a time as any to talk to him. She had been rather bitchy in the car and mostly silent at dinner, and she didn’t want him sulking all day tomorrow. She threw her soft old terrycloth robe over her light cotton pajamas, belting it tightly, and made sure her key was in the pocket before leaving the room herself.

At the pool she could just make out his pale form in the water, slowly stroking along. It wasn’t a very large pool, bigger than most motel ones but far smaller than the Olympic-sized one she knew he often used in the FBI gym. Silently she padded over to one of the lounge chairs and sat on the edge, waiting for him to notice her.  
Mulder was doing cooling down laps; he’d managed a few fast ones but the pool really wasn’t big enough. It wasn’t until he was considering getting out that he noticed that he wasn’t alone and swam over to the side. “Scully?”

“Yeah. I saw you leave your room and wondered if you had a minute to talk.”

“Coming in for a swim?” he asked, treading water. “The water’s just right and there’s no sign saying that the pool closes at any particular time.”

“I’m in my pajamas,” she replied, plucking at the collar of her robe. 

“So? Swim in them. You’ve already got your robe here and I’m sure you packed more than one set, right?”

She felt herself weakening; it had cooled down from earlier but was still humid enough that a swim was appealing. And she wasn’t wearing underwear beneath the pajamas, which she sometimes did when out of town, so that wasn’t a worry. Glancing around, she stood and removed the robe, tossing it on the chair next to the one that held his towel. Her summer pajamas were a short-sleeved, button-down top and matching Capri pants set that came halfway down her calf, enough to cover her decently should she be dragged out of bed at three a.m. but light and comfortable enough to sleep easily in.

“Your jammies are cute, Scully,” he remarked as she walked to the other end of the pool where there was a set of steps leading down into the water. “Different than the ones you usually wear—I like ‘em.”

“Thanks,” she replied as she walked down into the cool water; he was right, it was just the perfect temperature. She ducked under smoothing back her hair, and then swam out to him at the other end. Hanging onto the edge of the wall and kicking idly she said, “Mulder, I know I’ve been in quite a mood lately and—“

He interrupted her, still treading easily. “Scully, I know damn well I’m not the easiest person in the world to have to deal with on a day-to-day basis.”

She huffed, slightly miffed at being interrupted. “That’s the understatement of the year.”

He grinned and she felt her heart melt. “But you love it.”

Lifting an eyebrow as he moved closer Scully replied cautiously, “I never said that.” She had to suppress her first instinctive response, which have been, “No, I love you.”

“You always come back for more—and so do I,” he said softly, moving over and reaching out to put his hands on the pool wall on either side of her, just brushing her body with his. His legs, still treading easily, moved the water around hers though they didn’t touch. Realizing that he was finally making his move as he inclined his head down towards her she let go of the wall, turning to face him fully, put her hands on his broad shoulders and met his mouth halfway, reveling in the feel of his warm body coming full against hers in the cool water. To her delighted surprise he didn’t ravage her mouth but instead kissed her gently yet passionately, his tongue asking permission rather than just invading. But as the kiss went on he pressed her back against the tile wall with his body and they grew more frenzied, both of them gasping for breath around the others’ lips even as their legs entangled.

Finally he broke it and leaned back just enough to see her face. The look on his caused a rush of blood to her lower body, which was already well-aroused from the feeling of his engorged cock pressed against her belly. He opened his mouth and she laid a finger over it, shaking her head. Anything that either of them might say would likely ruin this magical night and she had no plans on that happening. Instead she turned in his arms and hoisted herself out of the pool, turning to look down at him when she was on her feet and then put a hand out. He shot out of the water like he was on springs and took her hand; without hesitation she led him out of the pool area, grabbing her robe on the way and ignoring the fact that both of them were dripping wet.

Once in her room she closed the door behind them without turning on a light and let go of his hand, dropping her robe and reaching for the bottom of her shirt. But his big warm hands were there first and he peeled the pajama top off of her, then the bottoms. To her surprise he then picked up his discarded towel and wrapped it around her, rubbing her chilled skin with it. “Don’t want you getting sick,” he rasped into her ear, steering her towards the bed. “Get under the covers.”

She did as requested and watched avidly from the bed, almost trembling with desire, as he stripped off his trunks then toweled his hair a little before sliding in next to her. The feel of his hard, naked body coming full against hers made her catch her breath, then he kissed her again and breathing was forgotten. His large warm hands were everywhere, caressing and rubbing her chilled skin and she returned the favor, finally feeling his contours as a lover and not just a friend or doctor. Scully knew she’d never been as aroused as she was right now; every part of her body was on red alert and she had never wanted a man as badly as she wanted him right now.

“Make love to me, Mulder,” she whispered into the darkness against his lips as they slowly broke the kiss, gasping for breath. He groaned but didn’t say anything as he moved up over her, lying over her like a warm, living, breathing blanket. Their mouths met again in a passionate kiss, both of them groaning and gasping as he slid inside her. 

“OhJesusScully,” he breathed into her mouth, his strong body moving on hers as he began to stroke in and out while still laying full-length on her, his hands in her hair. The weight of his body, the strength of his muscles, the way he was kissing her, and the deep masculine smell of him all worked together to bring her to an explosively tingling climax that left her limp, damp and breathless. She barely had the strength to roll over and pull the covers over her shoulder before she was out like a light.

***

The next morning Mulder barely knocked before he stuck his head in her room again via the connecting door. “Ready to go? It’s almost eight and I want to grab breakfast before we hit the road.”

She smiled languidly at him as she pulled a black blazer on over her white blouse, having been up with the alarm at seven. “Almost. Want to go to the café again, or look for somewhere else?”

He narrowed his eyes at her; why was Scully so calm and relaxed when she’d been a raging virago the day before? Had she maybe gone for a swim after he’d left the pool? Her light had been out when he’d returned but he thought he’d heard her moving around after he’d showered off the pool chlorine and was getting ready for bed. “You’re feeling better today, I take it?”

She smiled slightly, thinking of her fantasy of him and the intense orgasm it had generated; he’d never in a million years have a clue as to why she was feeling so good. “Oh yeah. Let’s go eat, I’m starving.”

If I didn’t know better, Mulder thought, I’d swear she’s gotten laid.

***

They rode out to the construction site where Adrian Peregrine had disappeared with Trooper Andy Stafford in a marked state police cruiser, leaving their rental car at the barracks. Mulder, who sat in the back seat, kept himself amused by watching how the cars around them on the highway slowed down noticeably when they spotted the police car. Scully and Stafford seemed to have hit it off well; it turned out that the trooper’s father had been in the Army and they were chatting about having been dependents of a serviceman while growing up.

If he hadn’t know that Stafford was very happily married, Mulder mused, he might have worried about the way they were getting along. He and Scully didn’t play well with outsiders who might be interested in the other; her antagonism towards Detective White and his against Phillip Padgett, among others, were proof positive of that. But he had no concerns in that area with Stafford and Scully despite the animated conversation, nodding, and laughter going on in the front seat.

“Here we are,” Stafford announced as they pulled off the road and parked on the muddy shoulder next to a tall chain-link fence. There was a wide break in it and blurred tire tracks in the mud leading up the hill beyond. A bullet-riddled, faded sign at the bottom warned trespassers off though there was no gate or locks on the fence.

“Here we are where?” Mulder said, opening the door and squinting into the light rain. It was a good bit colder than yesterday, overcast and drizzling with a dim watery light that made him wonder if this was what it looked like for his fish when they peered out of the aquarium. There was nothing around but the fence, mud, and straggly grass leading up a fairly steep hill. He could see a sign at the top of the hill but it was too far away and the rain just heavy enough that he couldn’t read it.

The state trooper pointed towards the top of the hill beyond the fence through the already-fogging windshield. “Construction site’s up there, but I’m not driving that in anything less than a four-wheel-drive or we’d slide right back down,” he said firmly. “Climbing up there on the grass is a better alternative.”

As he got out of the car Mulder studiously did not look at Scully or anywhere near her. Just earlier this morning he had teased her about her sensible shoes and, after breakfast, she’d insisted on going back to the motel change them for a pair that had higher heels. Now, he knew, she had to be ready to flay him alive and it was all he could do not to laugh out loud. But he honestly treasured his sex organs and managed to hide his amusement as they began to trudge up the scraggly wet grass, staying to one side of the muddy dirt track.

He stayed behind her, unobtrusively ready to catch her if she slipped but he noted that she dug those heels in and made it up to the top without incident, though all three of them were breathing fairly heavily by the time they arrived. Now there were signs of a construction site not visible from the road below; heavy machinery scattered around including a crane holding a generator some distance from the torn-up ground, A-frames and I-beams stacked to one side opposite a mud-splattered trailer with a sign on the door noting that it was the construction office. There was another road leading back into the trees, even rougher than the one that led up the hill although it appeared to be much less steep. Stafford led them to a large hole in the midst of it all, which was easily a couple hundred feet on each side. The corners had been propped up with I-beams but the sides were still dirt, the one they stood at partially collapsed into the thick, dirty water that filled the bottom of the shallow hole.

“I was wondering if all this rain makes construction difficult,” Mulder remarked. 

“We’re having more than usual this spring,” Stafford nodded. “The valley we’re in, the Rogue Valley, is a weather shadow and the mountains around us deflect a lot of rain so we get less than the rest of the Pacific Northwest, and Oregon in particular. Usually late spring and most of the summer is prime building time; warm with very little rain. Not this year, though. We’ve gotten pounded the last couple of weeks.”  
“But they started anyway, I see,” Scully said, walking a few steps closer to the caved-in edge of the hole that, according to the sign at the top of the hill, would one day be the headquarters of the Evender Group, whatever or whomever that was. She peered in, frowning and pursing her lips.

“Well, yeah, I’m sure they’re on some kind of schedule,” Stafford said, staying where he was. Mulder followed her, wondering if she’d seen something down in the hole. 

“Where’s Peregrine’s car?” Mulder asked over his shoulder, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Scully, at the edge of the hole, slip and without thinking about it lunged and grabbed her flailing arm, pulling her back from the brink. But her feet, clad in three-inch heels, still went out from under her; he held on but she slid down the mud into the water in the hole and dragged him with her even with his feet braced against the ground, both of them letting out a startled yell as they slid towards, and then into, the water.

“Dammit, this water is freezing!” she yelled, splashing as she scrambled for purchase in the mud.

Mulder hung on to her, Stafford grabbing and holding onto the shoulders of his suit jacket, which finally stopped their descent. He caught her other hand and pulled her out before she got wet above the waist, the trooper dragging both of them to somewhat drier ground. As they stood there with Scully dripping and Mulder covered in mud, his shoes and socks soaked, he said, “I’ve got a blanket in the trunk, I’ll be right back.”

Seeing how she was starting to shiver Mulder pulled Scully into his arms, ignoring her teeth-chattering protests and trying to pull away. “I’m just trying to keep you warm, stop fighting me. Come on, it’s not like I’m going to make you any dirtier,” he told her, rubbing her back through her blazer. She did so without argument—for a change—and they were huddled together when Stafford returned. Mulder took the blanket from him, wrapped it around her shoulders and said, “We should probably go back to the motel and both change before doing anything else. The last thing you need is to catch a cold, and we’re both a mess.”

“Fine, whatever,” she said through gritted teeth, clearly disgruntled, and let him lead her back to the car with an arm around her shoulders over the blanket. Since both of them were covered in mud in addition to her wet pants legs and feet, they laid the blanket over the back seat and both rode there although she studiously kept most of the seat between them. 

Back at the motel he guided her into her room; at this point she was shivering badly despite Stafford having turned up the heat in the car. The trooper had left, agreeing to meet them back at the site later after Scully had warmed up and they’d changed out of their wet, muddy clothes.

“You go take a hot shower and I’ll change, then we can head back out,” he told her, and went into his room. But just a few minutes later, when he was standing naked and going through his suitcase to find a clean pair of boxer-briefs to replace the damp ones he’d removed, he heard Scully’s voice and then the connecting door swung open with no warning. He looked up to see her standing in the doorway with wet hair wearing nothing but a thin white motel towel, holding what appeared to be an empty shampoo bottle in one hand. They stared at each other for a few beats then he got his feet moving and walked over to where she stood, not bothering to hide either his nudity or growing tumescence. When he wrapped his arms around her he heard the empty bottle hit the carpet, then he lowered his mouth to hers—giving her plenty of time to stop him if she’d wanted to—and the blazing kiss they shared chased everything out of his head except the woman in his arms.

Still kissing her he maneuvered them back into her room and, despite a few thumps and bumps here and there, managed to get her to the bed, where they stopped by its side. He stepped back and very deliberately tugged the tuck loose so that the towel fell to her feet and she stood naked staring up at him with wide blue eyes. Still looking at each other frankly they fell onto the bed, Mulder rolling her so that she ended up on top of him, her face now buried in his shoulder as he kissed her neck. “I want you, I need you, Scully,” he murmured, running his hands over her soft, warm skin as her hands slid beneath his shoulders, most of her weight draped over his body. “Do you want me, too?”

“God, yes,” she breathed into his ear, then lifted a little, turned her head and kissed him with a fierceness that both aroused and amazed him. With no further ado she began to slide down on his almost-painfully-hard cock, her body tight and hot and almost drippingly wet. “Ohhhhh, Mulder!”

He could do nothing more than groan breathlessly into her mouth, holding her hips steady as he pushed back into her. When he was buried deep, her soft warm body meeting his pubic hair, he paused for just a second to revel in the sensation before guiding her hips into rising and falling on him, her cheek against his. Her soft, warm skin slid against his as they moved together, Mulder pumping up into her downstroke for what seemed like forever but never long enough. “Can you finish like this?” he finally murmured, realizing how close he was getting. 

“I’m almost there,” she gasped into his ear, then began to lick and suck at his neck.   
“Oh my God, Scully, I can’t hold on much longer,” he rasped in return, rolling his head so that she had better access to his neck and reveling in the sensations she was causing in him; he was getting close to the brink. Then he heard her almost-startled gasping moan as her mouth left his skin, her pelvis slamming down on his. He looked up to see her sitting up on him, her hands cupping her quivering taut-tipped breasts. She was looking down at him with such love that it made his heart skip a beat. That was it; he was done, a goner, finished. He bit his lip to stop himself from crying out loud as he emptied himself into her.

“Mulder? You ready to head back out?”

Jesus, he thought as he opened his eyes and got up from the edge of the bed on shaky legs, tossing the wadded-up hand towel towards the bathroom, that was close. I thought it’d take her a lot longer to shower and change!

“Gimme a minute,” he called back towards the closed and locked connecting door, grabbing clean underclothes out of the suitcase. He still needed to wipe the mud off his legs just above where his socks had been. “Why don’t I meet you in the café in ten minutes?”

After he heard her room door close he sank back onto the bed almost weakly. Had he not made a point of making sure that both doors to his room were firmly locked that might have given him a heart attack. But more than once Scully had nearly walked in on him while he was fantasizing about her so he knew to make sure that it didn’t happen. This was probably not the best time to be doing it, but he’d needed the relief after holding her against him earlier had aroused him. Still, he thought almost disgustedly as he headed for the bathroom to wash, if he ever did get her in bed he’d probably take the meaning of One Minute Wonder to new heights! 

***

Back at the construction site the three of them walked around keeping an eye out for anything unusual. Mulder was probably looking for UFO scorch marks, Scully thought with a mixture of fondness and exasperation as she followed the tire tracks from where Peregrine’s car had been parked to where it’d been loaded on a flatbed and taken to the state police barracks to be examined. Stafford was looking around the outside of the construction office trailer, which they had already investigated inside using keys provided by the company. 

“I’m getting nothing,” she called to her partner as they walked past each other a few yards apart. “You?”

“No, there’s been too much activity since that night,” he agreed. “Hey, Stafford, you ready to give it up?”

“Yeah, may as well,” the trooper called back, trudging towards them. “Maybe we can try again once the rain lets up.”

“Won’t they go back to work when that happens?” Scully said, walking over to join the two men. 

“Yeah, and it’ll be easier to interview all of the workers who were here that night; I got lucky and found them all here waiting for the supervisor the next morning so with any luck you can do the same tomorrow,” Stafford said. “It’s supposed to clear up overnight, so hopefully they’ll be here in the morning.”

Mulder turned to Scully. “We should talk to Peregrine’s agent in the meantime. Unless there’s someone in particular you wanted to interview.”

She thought about it, and then shook her head. “No… are we going to L.A.?”

They began walking back to the cars as they talked. “Yeah, I have a reservation on standby at the Rogue Valley airport,” Mulder said. “It wasn’t hard to find someone to fly us, apparently there are plenty of private pilots who do the trip on the drop of a hat.”

“Yeah, a lot of folks fly out to L.A., San Fran, Sacramento, Vegas, Seattle, you name it, for business as well as pleasure,” Stafford said. “We are kind of remote here and often it’s easier to fly than drive. Depending on the type of plane it’s usually no more than two or three hours down to L.A..”

Scully looked pointedly at Mulder as they reached the bottom of the hill but didn’t say anything; he’d been the one to make their travel arrangements so she knew that the three-hour drive from Eugene had been his decision.

“It’s a commuter flight, I’m not sure what kind of plane, but they told me it’s about two hours,” Mulder said, shaking the trooper’s hand. “Thanks for all your help, Andy, what time did you want us to meet you here tomorrow?”

“If it’s not raining the guys usually get here around five a.m. or so, and I’d like to get to them before they start.” The trooper shook Scully’s hand as well. “It was really nice meeting you, Dana, hopefully you both can come to dinner with my wife and I before you go.”

“I’d love to meet her; we’ll make the time,” Scully said firmly. She was going to get more than long drives and falling in muddy holes out of this trip, she thought grimly as she got in the car. If wasn’t to be mad sex with her partner, a home-cooked meal was just the thing.

***

Two and a half hours later they landed at a small airport just outside LA in a six-passenger twin-engine Cessna. Scully was relieved that they hadn’t had a long wait to take off, although there had been a holdup before leaving due to the other two people on the flight were continuing on to Phoenix. She wondered, as she often did, how Mulder managed to get these little side trips approved especially since the case they were on seemed to have little or nothing to do with the FBI. 

The agent’s office was in a small three-story building off the beaten path, wedged between a half-empty strip mall and a bustling Burger King. A freestanding signboard in the lobby showed that the place was rented mostly by agents, managers, lawyers and, of all things, two plastic surgeons. “Nothing like showbiz,” Mulder said, flicking the black board with his fingertips as they walked past it towards the elevator. “What more do you need.”

“It’s pretty obvious that this is the starving-artist part of town,” Scully pointed out as she jabbed the button with one finger. “I don’t think we’ll see Brad Pitt or Meryl Streep wandering these halls.”

Mulder nodded, grinning, as he stepped into the somewhat rickety elevator beside her. “The idea I got is that Betty Singer is a very small-time agent; she seems to get left behind when the rare one or two of her clients moves up in the world. These days she manages mostly lounge singers, character actors, comedians, that sort of thing; I even found an exotic dancer on her client list. She doesn’t handle the teenybopper idols anymore although she did well with them back in the seventies and early eighties.”

Scully shrugged. “Ten percent’s ten percent, I guess,” she said as they left the elevator and headed down a long hallway painted a rather bilious shade of light green more appropriate for a 1950s hospital than a modern office building.  
“Although I couldn’t find any proof of it, I suspect that there might have been some kind of scandal involved regarding why she stopped representing the teenaged boys,” Mulder said thoughtfully as they walked, his hand unconsciously in its place on her lower back. “Why else would she stop handling the only real meal tickets she ever had?”

When they stepped through the green glass doors that announced the BTS Talent Agency in faded gold stick-on letters, the middle-aged, heavyset woman manning an old-fashioned metal desk in the miniscule reception area greeted them with an evil eye. “You have an appointment?” she snapped, slamming a magazine closed and moving it aside to show a large desk pad covered with scribbles that she scanned quickly. Her heavily mascara’d eyes were narrowed and suspicious. “I don’t see nothing on my calendar and we don’t take walk-ins.”

It was all Mulder could do not to glance at Scully; he knew she’d have that eyebrow up and it would start him laughing. Instead he got his badge out and flashed it at her, saying, “Agents Mulder and Scully from the FBI. We don’t have an appointment but I did call Ms. Singer earlier this week and let her know we’d be stopping in.” He noted that the clear but dusty acrylic nameplate on the desk had “R. Singer” written on it, and wondered if she was a relation.

“Oh yeah. She did mention somethin’ about the FBI coming by. Okay, have a seat and I’ll let her know.” Instead of reaching for the phone, the heavy woman got up and disappeared through the door behind her desk, closing it firmly behind her.  
This time the partners did glance at each other, Mulder cracking a grin and Scully a brief close-mouthed smile. No words were needed as they took a few steps over to the cracked vinyl chairs nearby and sank into them side by side. The office was decorated with framed photos of celebrities, mostly signed. It would have looked nice, Scully mused, had they all been either black and white or color and the same size, but there was a mixture of everything that made the pea-soup walls just look sad and kitschy.

The door behind the desk opened again and the heavyset woman ushered them in as she stepped out. “Miz Singer will see you now,” she intoned. 

They glanced at each other again as they got up, Mulder fighting a smartass grin and Scully biting her lower lip. He held back so she could precede him into the office, his hand resting briefly on the small of her back as she passed by and went through the doorway into the other room.

Unlike the rest of the building and outer office, the inner sanctum was quite nicely decorated, understated and almost elegant, Scully thought. The carpet was a mid-pile beige with matching painted walls, a brown and tan-patterned wallpaper strip up by the ceiling breaking the monotony of the dun color. The furniture was in dark walnut, an L-shaped desk with two matching chairs in front of it, a hutch and bookcase on the back wall behind the desk. Though the room wasn’t large, its setup made it feel comfortable rather than cramped. Two large windows, one on each wall in a corner, let in bright California sunshine through partly open white metal blinds.

The woman rising from behind the desk was a well-preserved sixty-something or perhaps early seventies, Mulder decided as he followed Scully into the office. She had obviously dyed, blonde-streaked medium brown hair, a round face unflattered by her short hairstyle, and while a bit on the heavy side was solid rather than fat. Her makeup, though not as obvious as the receptionist’s, was still applied with quite the heavy hand. The nameplate on her desk, wooden with gold letters, read “Bettina Singer” he noted, and there was a close family resemblance to the receptionist; sisters if not close cousins, he guessed. “Agents, good to meet you,” she greeted with practiced courtesy as she firmly shook their hands and then all three seated themselves. “What can I do to help you?”

“Well, as you know we’re investigating Adrian Peregrine’s disappearance,” Scully began, holding up the file folder she held. “We were hoping—“

The older woman interrupted her, a non-flattering frown now on her rotund face. “I’m not sure what you think I can help with. He never showed for a photo shoot last Saturday, which I’m in Dutch with the photographer for, and on top of that he owes me three hundred bucks for his travel costs.”

Scully was glaring at the other woman, lips held tightly; Mulder knew it was because she hated to be interrupted mid-word. He leapt in before she said something she might later regret. “When was the last time you saw or spoke to him?” he asked.

“I talked to him last Friday afternoon, he called me to confirm his flight and hotel reservations,” the agent said. “But I hadn’t actually seen him in a couple of months, when he came here to talk me into representing him again.”

“He had to talk you into it?” Scully asked.

Singer shook her head, not a strand of her sprayed hair moving from its place. “I hadn’t seen him since he was seventeen,” she said, leaning back in her worn leather chair and folding her arms over her chest. “Hadn’t heard a word from him in over twenty years, and he comes waltzing in here out of nowhere looking like a lumberjack. If you’ve seen his picture you’ll note that he didn’t grow up to be a handsome man, but when he sang for me I had to agree that he still has some talent there. So,” she shrugged, “I agreed to take him on. I managed to drum up a little interest using his past credits, and called him a week ago Thursday to come out for a photo shoot to start his portfolio. Now, however, I’m looking like a fool since he never showed or called or anything.”

Mulder was nodding understandingly, more or less holding her eyes as she talked “And you have no idea why he might have skipped town without word to you or anyone else?”

“I can’t imagine. He knew this would be his only chance, and after how much he bugged me about it I can’t imagine what could have stopped him from showing up,” she said. “He owed me money but we both knew I’d get it back and then some if he got even one of the jobs I had him in mind for.”

“Do you know if he had any other debts?” Scully asked. 

Singer shook her head again. “I have no idea. I do know that he’d wanted to pick up his paycheck Friday from the construction company before he left, and had hinted that he wanted to stay in L.A. and not go back to Oregon, but I wasn’t sure about that yet. I wanted to wait and see if anyone was more than vaguely interested beyond a guest shot on Carson or Arsinio. If one of those had developed I was going to see if I could get him to make a demo tape.”

Mulder glanced over and Scully nodded slightly, letting him know that he could take it from here. Leaning forward and resting his forearms on his knees he smiled a little and then said, “There was some, ah, question of impropriety regarding your clients back in the early 1980s, wasn’t there, Ms. Singer?”

The older woman’s florid face went pale, then flushed a bright, unbecoming mottled red, clutching the edge of her desk with white knuckles. “No charges were ever filed, it was just hearsay from a jealous ex-client,” she all but snarled. “I stopped representing him because he’d run his course, and he tried to say that I’d seduced him before he was of legal age. The truth is that I’d never touched any of my boys, they were far too valuable to me as working property to risk anything else.”

Her reaction and attitude spoke volumes about how untrue that was, and Mulder pounced on it. “So despite that fact that you don’t really handle much other than comedians and strippers these days, you decided to take Adrian on out of the goodness of your heart?” he said with clear sarcasm, watching her carefully. “It wouldn’t be because he was holding something over your head, blackmailing you, would it?”

Betty Singer had frozen, staring wide-eyed at him across the expanse of desk. Then she pulled herself together and a practiced blank mask slipped down over her features. “I don’t know what else I could possibly help you with, but I have an appointment in fifteen minutes that I need to get ready for,” she said coldly, rising from behind the desk. “If you’ll excuse me.”

“Where were you Thursday evening, Ms. Singer?” Scully asked.

“At home, watching TV,” she said tightly. “And before you ask I don’t have any witnesses to it, but I certainly didn’t go all the way to Oregon and back between leaving work that evening at eight and coming in at ten the next morning. And now I need you to leave.”

Both agents rose, but Mulder wasn’t done. “Ms. Singer, in case you didn’t realize it, I want to inform you that you are a suspect in this case,” he said bluntly to see how she’d react. Though there were still spots of color high on her cheeks that shone through the pink rouge, her tight mask didn’t slip. “Until Adrian Peregrine is located please keep us informed of your whereabouts—and I would recommend not leaving the state.” He dropped his card on her desk and turned to follow Scully out, but didn’t miss the glare Singer threw at him when she thought he couldn’t see her.

In the outer office Scully stopped to talk to the receptionist, who scowled at them both as the inner door all but slammed behind them. When he heard her asking for directions to the ladies’ room he was surprised and started to mention that they’d seen the bathrooms when they’d come out of the elevator, but Scully didn’t do things without good reason so he held his peace. Once outside the office, however, he moved up next to her as they walked down the horrid green hallway. “What was that all about?” he asked.

“I got a look at the calendar; there are no appointments at all on it today,” she said rather smugly. “You called her on it, Mulder. Something shady is going on in her dealings with Peregrine. I’d say she’s suspect number one, and although she was here she certainly could have hired someone to get rid of him.”

“Or he could have come here and confronted her, despite leaving his car at the construction site,” Mulder said. “Might have gotten a ride home with a co-worker who doesn’t want to admit it.”

“And he ends up dead either way,” Scully mused out loud as they left the elevator. She wasn’t about to point out that he’d dropped his lights-in-the-sky line of reasoning; she was just glad that he wasn’t mentioning it.

They climbed into the rental car and Mulder blasted the A.C. as it was well over eighty outside and a furnace inside the vehicle though they’d been gone less than half an hour. He tugged down the knot of his tie and pulled open the top button of his white dress shirt. “But what about the reported lights in the sky, which is what brought us out here in the first place?” he said. “You think she maybe got the Predator to knock him off?”

Dammit, I should have known it couldn’t last. Scully huffed, deliberately ignoring the curling of dark hair at his throat that attracted her eyes like a magnet. For some insane reason the sight of it often got her going and now was one of those times. “Almost every time we get a report of lights in the sky it’s swamp gas or insects or—“

He had been about to pull out of the parking spot but now jammed the gearshift into park and turned to face her, a thunderous frown on his handsome face. “Are you kidding me, Scully? How often have I been wrong? And how can you say that with—“

“God, Mulder, don’t start now, I’m sweaty and tired and just want to get back to the motel and relax for the evening,” she snapped, glaring back at him. “I am so not in the mood for this shit.”

“Shit?!” he said incredulously, staring over at her with wide eyes. “You think my theories are shit?”

“Goddamn it, I didn’t mean that and you know it—I meant the crap that woman gave us,” she dissembled quickly. “Can we just go, please?”

Glowering, he pulled out and headed towards the airport without another word. Scully laid her head back against the back of the seat and closed her eyes, wondering if they would ever stop butting heads. 

But after turning into the car rental lot he continued on and found a remote space in the far back of a huge cement garage. Scully looked around warily as he turned the car off, turning to face her. This rental was a Buick Regal, nearly as big as the one back in Larkspur. “What are you doing, Mulder?”

“What I should have done years ago,” he snarled, then reached across the space between them with both hands, grabbed her shoulders, and yanked her to him so that they met in the middle of the long seat. “I was going to try and talk to you, but this is even better!” Before she could react he had covered her mouth with his, still holding her tightly enough to be uncomfortable, and gave her the most blistering, arousing kiss she’d ever experienced or even imagined.

Scully melted into his arms, not wanting to waste this opportunity no matter how it had come about. He must have felt her surrender because his hands left her upper arms and wrapped around her shoulders, pulling her tight against his firm chest. She reciprocated by clutching him around the neck, urging him even closer to her.  
Their mouths slanted against each other, occasionally gasping for breath around the kiss, tongues dueling. Scully had initially closed her eyes but now cracked them open to see Mulder peering back at her through half-closed eyes, and the sight caused a jolt to race through her belly. As if she wasn’t aroused enough.

He tore his mouth away, but didn’t release his hold on her. “God, I need you, Scully,” he rasped, eyes burning down into hers. “Tell me that you don’t want me just as much and I’ll let you go, never mention this again.”

She gazed up at him, feeling helpless in the face of her own passion for this incredible, flawed, handsome man. “I can’t do that,” she whispered brokenly. “I… want you too.”

“Jesus.” He crushed her against his chest again, one hand rising to stroke her hair almost roughly. Their mouths met in another wild kiss, then he moved back just enough to reach between them. “Gotta gotta gotta touch you,” he told her, swiftly undoing the buttons on her white blouse. He unsnapped the front closure of her bra and then his large warm hands were on her breasts, thumbs just brushing over the nipples, his eyes glued to what his hands were doing. Then one slipped down and under the waistband of her slacks, cupping her mound, fingers already reaching, reaching for her wetness—

Then he shook her gently, and she heard his voice as if from far away saying her name. She opened her eyes, confused, to see that while she was, indeed, in the car, her partner was sitting behind the wheel while she was in the passenger seat. He was reaching across and lightly shaking her shoulder. “You okay, Scully? I’ve never had such a hard time waking you up before.”

“Bad dream,” she rasped; hopefully that would explain any possible moans she might have let slip while dreaming. Then she cleared her throat and lifted her head to look around. They were back at the airport parked in front of the car rental office; she must have fallen asleep on the drive from Singer’s, she realized. She was horrified that she had had an erotic dream about him while he was sitting less than two feet away!

“You wanna talk about it?” he said, removing his hand and turning to face her fully, resting the other forearm on top of the steering wheel. “Our plane won’t be in for almost an hour, and I have a lot of experience with nightmares as you well know.”

“Uh, no. Personal.” She had to look away from him, remembering the look on his face from her dream before it faded away. “Sorry.”

“Fine.” Now his voice was cold rather than warm and open. She knew she’d hurt his feelings but didn’t know what else to do; she was too groggy to make up something as well as aghast at herself. Great, now Mulder would be sulking all the way back to Larkspur. “Guess we may as well go in, then, huh?”

Annoyed by his tone she snapped, “I can’t share everything in my life with you,” as they got out of the car. Scully snuck a glance at him as they walked to the building and noted his tight-lipped dead-ahead glare, muscle jumping in his jaw, and knew that she had just inadvertently made things worse. Much worse.

***

As soon as they disembarked from the Cessna at the Rogue Valley Airport and turned their phones on, both began to chirp. Mulder moved away from Scully and answered his, the first finger of his other hand plugging his opposite ear against the sound of the airplanes on the ramp. “Mulder.”

“Fox? It’s Andy. Where are you? Why weren’t you guys answering your phones?”  
“We’re at the airport, we just got back. We had them turned off on the plane. What’s going on?”

“Well, we found Adrian Peregrine. And I think I owe you guys an apology for dragging you both all the way out here.”

***

Half an hour later they stood next to the giant hole at the construction site, staring down at an unzipped body bag on a gurney. What was barely recognizable as the ex-child star’s body was exposed, and after a glance Mulder turned away though it didn’t seem to bother Scully, of course. What was left of the man was not a pretty sight. There were a few construction workers still around and none of them were close enough to see nor, he noted, even looking their way.

“My guess is that he’s been underwater since Friday night or Saturday morning,” Scully said, and when he heard the rustle of plastic he turned back to see that she’d flipped the bag back over the hideously swollen, pale face with its pallid staring eyes. “So what exactly happened, Andy?”

“Well, they began to drain the hole when it stopped raining this afternoon and found him,” the trooper said, pushing his cap back and scratching at the crown of his head. “My guess is that he must have fallen in the hole and no one saw him, and he drowned. Though where the lights came from that the other workers reported I don’t know, and I don’t understand why he didn’t just climb out, either. The water couldn’t have been that deep that night, it had just begun raining when the workers left.”

“Can we take the body now?” one of the two EMTs standing nearby asked. “The ME’s at the morgue waiting for it.”

“Sure,” Scully said, and stepped over to where the men were standing as they pushed the gurney away. “I’m going to ride with the body, Mulder, and stand in on the autopsy. I’ll give you a call when I’m done.”

“Right,” he said, watching her walk away, trailing the gurney. Then, turning back to the trooper he said, “Any chance we can safely get down in that hole and look around?”

“Sure. They drained the rest of the water and we can rappel down easily enough,” Andy said, pointing to the pair of ropes tied around a nearby bulldozer’s roof strut and leading down into the hole. “That’s how they got him out of there.” 

A short time later they stood in the mucky bottom of the hole, both wearing thick gloves, hip waders, and hard hats provided by the construction company, which were required by law and neither had argued with. Both were carrying heavy industrial flashlights as well as they tromped back and forth in the thick, sticky, gooey mud. “Wish I had a camera,” Andy called over to Mulder as they examined the base of the wall where he and Scully and, presumably, Peregrine had fallen down. “You in one of your fancy-ass suits and ties and grubby old hip waders.”

“You don’t look much better, Trooper,” Mulder shot back, playing his flashlight carefully over the mucky dirt. “Since when does your uniform come equipped for fishing?”

“Don’t I wish,” the other man called back. “Beats the shit out of this. What are we looking for, anyway?”

“What I think I’ve found,” Mulder said as something crunched under his foot. Stepping back, he reached down and carefully extracted what looked to be a short but wide metal tube from the mud.

“What is that?”

He wiped it off against the grimy hip waders, turning it against the material to get the mud off, and then showing it to his companion. “As I figured, a flashlight. This is what made the lights in the sky, I’m betting.” He handed the handle to Andy, then reached down and, in a short time of rooting around in the thick mud, came up with one D battery and the cracked lens. “My guess is, he was walking around with this flashlight when he slipped and fell in the hole. The light flashed upwards and caused the flashing lights which was what the other men saw as they left. Although, again, why he didn’t just call for help or climb out is beyond me.”

They trudged through the thick mud back to the ropes, then waved at the construction workers who were waiting to help them up. Mulder stuffed his finds into the pocket of the waders and grabbed the rope, bracing his feet against the dirt wall. Together he and the trooper walked up the wall as the workers pulled them, and once over the top he showed them what he’d found. “Yeah, that’s one of our flashlights,” the foreman nodded as the two men removed the gloves, hard hats, and waders. “So you think he mebbe slipped and fell down there and hit his head or sumpthin?”

Andy nodded, handing his gear over to the nearest worker. “Or someone may have cold-cocked him, perhaps with this very flashlight. At any rate, don’t do any more work here until the coroner gives us clear cause of death because if there are any questions about how he died this will turn into a murder investigation.”

“This damn thing aint never gonna get built,” the foreman sighed, but handed the empty flashlight tube back to Mulder and turned away, pulling his cell phone out of a case on his belt.

***

“It looks like he inhaled the wet mud as he slid down into the hole, probably panicked, then suffocated on it,” Scully told Mulder as she slipped her feet into her shoes. They were in the Medford hospital’s locker room, Scully having just changed back into her street clothes from scrubs. Though she had only planned to watch, the ME was glad to have her assistance so she’d helped with the autopsy and they’d gotten it done in record time. “Reminds me a little of that case in Michigan a few years ago, but there doesn’t appear to be anything supernatural about this one nor were there any signs of foul play. What an ignominious end.”

“Yeah, so much for his big comeback,” he agreed, standing by the doorway with arms folded. “I guess that’s it, then.”

“I guess it is.” Bracing her hands on her knees she looked down between her dark blue pantlegs at the green tile floor. “I hope you don’t think any less of me if I admit I’m kinda grossed out knowing I fell in that water while he was under it. Dead bodies don’t bother me, obviously, but I prefer to know where they are. I’m just glad I didn’t find him when I fell in.”

“God, I don’t blame you, or think any less of you,” Mulder said with a crooked grin. “I’d have let out my girlie scream if it had been me.”

She took a deep breath, stood, and looked over at him. “Mulder, I want to apologize for how short I was with you this afternoon. I didn’t mean to be rude, but you know I’m not used to sharing things like that. My dreams, I mean.” 

“S’okay, Scully. If you ever want to talk you know I’m here, and I don’t mean to push you,” he said, holding the door open as she walked towards him. “It’s a good thing we’re better at investigating than we are at personal business.”

“True,” she sighed, thinking that it was probably the main reason that they hadn’t gotten romantically involved. They’d probably fall apart in a week, she knew. Hell, the first time he ditched her it would be over. And she valued their partnership far too much to let that happen no matter how sexually desirable she found him. Besides which, by the time he made his move at this rate they’d probably be too old and feeble to have sex.

They had left the hospital and were heading for the rental car when Mulder’s phone beeped. She waited patiently while he talked, and once he’d hung up he turned to her. “Andy and his wife would like us to come to dinner tonight, despite how late it is,” he told her. “I guess she’s already cooking and won’t take no for an answer.”

Scully glanced at her watch; it was nearly eight o’clock in the evening. “Now that you mention it, I am starving,” she said to feel him out. If Mulder was really against it then she wouldn’t go without him, but a home-cooked meal did sound wonderful. “And it’s really too late to fly out tonight. What do you think?”

“I think we deserve a night to relax, and knowing Andy he wouldn’t invite us unless he meant it,” Mulder said as they got into the car. “You game?”

“Very,” she assured him. “I got plenty of game for this one.”

***

It was nearly midnight when they left the Sheffield’s and it was all they could do to drag themselves away. Andy’s wife Bonnie was just as nice and funny as her husband, and her cooking had both agents groaning from the amount of food they’d ingested. Scully was sure that she’d never eaten so much in one sitting in her life, and Mulder carried a plastic sack with leftovers she’d pressed on them.

They were quiet on the short ride back to the motel, but it was a comfortable silence. Mulder was ruminating on how lovely Scully had been tonight; she’d sat across the table from him next to Bonnie and it was all he could do not to stare at her the entire evening. He’d heard her laugh more tonight than he had in months and it had gone straight to his heart. After dinner Andy had told a series of racy jokes and to Mulder’s surprise Scully had answered with a few of her own, explaining that her brother Charlie always had new ones when he docked after a few months at sea. And though she rarely shared them, she knew that they wouldn’t be offended.

Scully always kept him guessing, he mused, a poised lady one minute and a bawdy, down-to-earth dirty-joke-telling pal the next. And always beautiful, so beautiful it almost hurt his eyes. He knew he’d never do better than her, but would she ever want him in any way other than a partner? Probably not, he admitted to himself. She could do so much better, he knew, even as his heart contracted with pain at the thought.

“Since I get up early anyway, Mulder, I’ll call and see how soon we can get a flight back,” Scully said as he pulled up outside their rooms. “Did you want to drive back to Eugene or take another puddle-jumper out of the airport here?”

“Whichever works,” he said. “When I originally made the travel plans I didn’t know you could get a plane at the airport here to take you to Eugene; I didn’t find that out until I looked into going to LA because I wanted to talk to the agent in person rather than over the phone.”

“All right, I’ll see what I can do, and call if we have to get a move on early. Otherwise you may as well sleep in,” she said as they got out of the car. “See you in the morning.”

“Tomorrow,” he said agreeably, then went into his room determined to not think about her for the rest of the night; he was getting in far too deep emotion-wise with a woman who was no more than his law-enforcement partner.

That lasted all of twenty minutes, exactly how long it took him to get ready for bed. Mulder dozed off gazing sightlessly at the TV thinking about the sound of her laughter and how pretty she looked when she smiled.

Later, he woke up just enough to realize that he had a raging hard-on and had been dreaming about Scully again. Turning on his side, he batted at the remote on the nightstand until the TV went off and then circled his straining cock with one hand, reaching down to cup his taut balls with the other. In his mind’s eye he was fucking Scully from behind, doing her as hard and fast as he could, and she was crying out and moaning and begging for more. He could see his rock-hard penis going in and out of her cunt, its lips pulling at him, oh so tight and hot, his cock glistening with her juices and hard enough to cut glass. Just as he heard her voice let go into a half-scream that signaled she’d come he let go completely, pumping and thrusting and giving her his all. He just barely had the presence of mind to roll over onto his other side, letting his semen spurt onto the cool side of the bed, and had gone back to sleep even before his hands fell away.

***

“We’ve got reservations on an eleven o’clock flight to Eugene,” Scully said into the phone as she turned the hot water handle on the outdated but workable bathtub. “Our flight to Denver isn’t until four-thirty, but at least the connecting flight to D.C. is only an hour after we arrive.”

“Sounds good. Thanks for taking care of that,” Mulder’s voice was warm over the line. He also sounded a little groggy, which didn’t surprise her since she’d called as soon as she’d heard movement in the connecting room. 

“I am going to indulge myself in a bath so do not bother me and I’ll be ready to head out of here at ten,” she added, putting the handset between shoulder and ear to pick up and unscrew the bottle of bath oil she always brought with her. “I’m still full from last night so I’m going to skip breakfast.”

“Okay, then, I’ll finish last night’s leftovers. You need any help, there, Scully, I’m happy to come over and wash your back,” he rasped, a grin in his voice. Rolling her eyes, Scully simply hung up.

She set her watch on top of the closed toilet lid across from the tub to keep track of time and gratefully sank down into the hot, sandalwood-scented water a short time later. God, how she needed this! Though it hadn’t been a difficult case, overall, there had been enough stress between them both sexual and just plain annoyance that it was really getting to her. When they got back, she thought, she might take a personal day and go hit a spa for a long-overdue mani-pedi, massage, and a few hours of general pampering. It had been a while since she’d felt the need to do that—since the case in California with the voodoo dolls if she remembered correctly—but it certainly wouldn’t hurt.

As she lay her head back against the cool rim of the tub Scully heard the unmistakable sound of the shower going on in the next room, the one Mulder was in. Clearly the bathrooms were side-by-side, probably that way to share the plumbing. But she cared less about that than the sudden image that filled her mind: Mulder, gloriously naked, dripping wet, and fully erect. The first two she had seen more than once but the third, never—although she had seen enough of his clothed erections to have a damned good idea of what he had. And if the length of his thumbs was any indication, he was even bigger than she suspected. Scully had discovered through personal experience that the old wives’ tale about men’s thumbs was more often true than not.

In her mind’s eye Scully saw Mulder in the shower, the hot water streaming over his lean, muscular body as he reached down to grasp his rock-hard cock. She could almost see his broad shoulders, the light furring of hair in the middle of his chest, his taut six-pack abs, and slender hips. The image caused a jolt in her belly and without even thinking about it Scully cupped her breasts, brushing the nipples with her thumbs. Another jolt, this one going from her nipples to her clit, greeted this sally and one hand snaked down to rub through the rust-colored curls at the apex of her sex.

She imagined him stroking himself long and slow, drawing out the enjoyment the way she did when she took care of herself—like now. There was time, no need to hurry unduly, and one stress relief was as good as another be it a hot bath or a good orgasm. She rubbed her middle finger around the swelling bump of her clit and then dipped lower, feeling the velvety moisture she was generating even in the hot bathwater. Lifting one leg out of the water and resting her ankle on the edge of the tub while bracing herself against the end with the other Scully sank one finger into her vagina, stroking gently in and out while the heel of her hand brushed over her clit. She could see Mulder caressing himself much the same way, not too rough yet, building his arousal, reaching down to cup his balls and roll them in his palm before grasping the head and squeezing it tightly. She imagined his hips thrusting forward, rocking back and forth in imitation of the sex act as his wet, heavily veined cock slipped through his fist.

Realizing that she was beginning to breathe heavily and could unintentionally start moaning Scully bit her bottom lip, having had much experience with not letting sound escape as she came. When she was home alone she felt no such unease but if the walls here were thin enough that she could hear the pitch of the water change as he washed, it was possible that he could hear even a low moan. She also didn’t dare let her hips flex lest the water begin splashing, but she was used to that too.  
Her finger moved back up to her clit, rubbing the underside up and down, causing electric shocks to radiate out from it. She realized that she was getting close and while she might have slowed herself another time, she knew it wasn’t a bad thing if she came quickly now. The image of Mulder stroking himself was ratcheting up her arousal faster than even her usual fantasies of him did, most likely because he really was on the other side of the wall. What got her going was that he could very well be taking care of himself thinking about her in the bath since he knew that was where she was.

That did it. Clamping her teeth down on her lower lip Scully rode out the waves of dazzling pleasure, one finger still rubbing her clit a bit more gently while the other squeezed her nipple until the breakers passed. Then she cupped her quivering vulva with the hand that was already down there, squeezing her breast gently with the other and gasping silently into the humid air. 

While recovering she heard the shower go off and a few light thumps and bumps of Mulder moving around in his bathroom. She let herself relax into the hot water, hands resting along the sides, for a few moments before reaching for the towel that she’d set on the floor by the side of the tub and drying them off. Picking up her watch she saw that it was already time to get out, and heaving a sigh she reached for the plug.

***

“Found out something interesting while I was waiting for you to finish getting ready,” Mulder said, turning to face her from the passenger seat and waving a piece of paper between them. “Andy faxed it over to me at the motel office this morning.”

“Don’t distract me when I’m driving, Mulder, just tell me,” Scully said with exasperation.

Not together ten minutes this morning and I’ve already managed to annoy her, Mulder thought with a sinking heart. No wonder we’re not a couple. “When they went through Peregrine’s rented room—his real name is, uh, was Floyd Dratch by the way—they found a bunch of bank receipts for deposits over the last six months. And guess whose name was on the checks?”

“Not Betty Singer?” Scully shook her head as he nodded his. “Really?”

“Yep. He was blackmailing her as we suspected. They also found papers in his trash with several drafts of letters he had written to her, telling her that there is no statute of limitations on statutory rape, and it looks like she believed him. Apparently it didn’t occur to him until a few months ago that he could blackmail her; the idea Andy got from the letters was that he didn’t realize that there was anything wrong with a thirty year old woman seducing a teenaged boy until he saw a similar case on the news.”

“No wonder she was so threatened by us! Obviously she knew he hadn’t told us but she must have been afraid that we’d find out. What is the law on statutory rape in California?”

“Depends on the case, I found out. They’re much tougher on adult males and juvenile females, but this likely would have still been prosecutable since actual sexual intercourse did take place over a series of months.”

“Wouldn’t it have been his word against hers?”

“Would have if he hadn’t had naked pictures of her in his possession,” Mulder said smugly. “That was more than enough to begin to build a case on, even thirty years later.”

“Aha. Are they going to go after her now?”

“I don’t know, Andy didn’t say. Apparently Peregrine decided that the couple grand a month he was getting from her wasn’t enough and he wanted his career back. I wonder what would have happened if he hadn’t been a good enough singer to make a comeback.”

“Something tells me that it likely would have been poetic justice one way or another,” Scully said as they reached the Rogue Valley International Airport, taking the turnoff for the car rental agencies. “Me, I’m just glad we can add another satisfactorily closed case to our roster. Skinner’s going to be relieved.”

“And not know what to do with himself if he can’t yell at us,” Mulder agreed. He stretched, and caught that she snuck a glance over at him. Instead of his usual hands against the top of the car pop his back stretch, he leaned further back over the seat until he felt the sides of his shirt slide up out of his pants. Another unobtrusive glance and sure enough, her eyes were right where he wanted ‘em. Unfortunately when he looked forward they were heading for the curb rather than staying neatly between the white lines. If they hit it at their present rate of speed Mulder suspected that the car would flip and that was not a good thing. “Uh, Scully, don’t think we want to find out how sturdy the roof of this car is,” he said, pointing ahead.

“Shit!” she swerved back into the lane, grumbling under her breath. “Sorry about that, Mulder.”

“Pobody’s nerfect, Scully,” he said in a deliberately offhand tone as he tucked his shirt back into his pants. He was filing away her reaction for further thought as she pulled up before the Lariat building. 

The rest of the trip home was uneventful, if a tad boring during their long wait at the Eugene Airport despite each having a book to read and a game of Scrabble on her travel board. But the connecting flight in Denver was on time and, best of all, their luggage made it all the way home with them, which wasn’t always a given when switching planes once, never mind twice. 

As they trudged out of Dulles dragging their suitcases Mulder said, “It’s still early, you want to get some dinner?”

“Nah, nothing personal, but I want to get home, get unpacked, and relax,” Scully said, flashing him a close-mouthed smile that just showed her dimples. “I’m not really hungry, that late lunch we had in Eugene really filled me up.” To kill time they'd ordered a four-course meal at the airport’s nice restaurant, beginning with an appetizer and ending with dessert. “I’ve eaten more in the last two days than I normally do in a week, I think.”

“No problem,” he said easily as they paused at the curb. Though they usually shared a ride, this time they had each driven their own car to the airport since Mulder had been in the Hoover and Scully at Quantico on a consult when they’d gotten word that the case was approved. “See you in the morning then?”

“Not tomorrow,” she replied immediately. “It’s Saturday. Unless there’s some kind of emergency don’t you dare bother me with work until Monday. We can write our report then.”

“Oh, right,” he said, feeling dull and stupid. “Well then, have a good weekend.”  
“You too,” she called back over her shoulder, already walking away towards the back of the long-term lot.

Maybe he’d been wrong about her reaction to him, Mulder thought as he turned in the opposite direction. Or, it hit him, was she trying to hide or deny her attraction by staying away from him? he wondered. It was something he did upon occasion, though he more often endured his own repressed longings just to be around her.  
But how to find out? He had no excuse to visit her tonight; he’d already played the one card he had and come up empty. But then it occurred to him that she’d said “don’t bother me with work until Monday”, not “don’t bother me at all”. Well, then, perhaps not using an excuse might just be the thing to do. And there was only one way to find out.

***

On the drive to her apartment Scully was distracted, though not as badly as she’d been when he’d stretched and flashed that strip of golden skin at her. It had been all she could do not to reach over and, with her fingertips, follow the line of dark hair that led down past his belt buckle to the treasure awaiting her there as she’d wanted to do for years. 

When did my longing for him go from simple attraction to a fever? she wondered. It’s like he’s the only man on the planet anymore; even if I wanted to go pick up a one-night-stand I couldn’t, simply because I don’t want anyone but him. It used to be that I knew that he was attractive and sexy but I didn’t have to have him in particular; now I do.

She mulled over the problem, trying to be her usual scientific self and failing badly. There was no way she could figure out exactly what it was about Mulder that attracted her and, hence, remove it. It all boiled down to two things: she wanted him with a yearning and passion that she’d never felt before in her life, and she was sick and tired of waiting for him to come to her. How much longer could she hold out before she decided that it didn’t matter? Before her lust boiled over and she no longer cared if he might refuse her? Was it better to do it with forethought than to lose control in the wrong place at the wrong time?

It’s Saturday night, neither of us has to be anywhere until Monday morning, a little voice in her head whispered. If I went over there now, or even better invited him to my place, we wouldn’t have to leave my bed for a good thirty-six hours. Two straight days of fucking ought to scratch my damned itch but good.

She snorted laughter, amused at her own base thoughts. Then she sobered as she slowed for a red light. She was so sick and tired of this constant ache in her heart and loins, wanting him so damned badly but holding herself back with a sheer dint of will that she’d never before guessed that she had in her. She had denied herself a lot of things over the years but this was by and far the worst and hardest. And she was sick and damned tired of it; if he didn’t want her as much as she wanted him then she needed to know, and right now.

Suddenly her eyes sharpened as she glanced across the intersection. There were bright halogen street lights overhead and, unless she was hallucinating, it certainly looked like Mulder sitting in his blue Taurus across the street waiting on the light just like she was. It was then that she looked at the street sign to see that she had passed her turnoff and was, in fact, halfway to Hegel Place. She had driven towards his apartment without consciously thinking about it. 

As she gazed over at him, his head turned and eyes met hers. She saw the edges of his mouth turn up in a grin and felt her own rising in answer. She raised a hand and waved, then pointed over the back seat: My place?

His smile turned into a full-fledged grin and he nodded, raising a hand to wave and point back the way she’d come as well.

When the light changed she went through the intersection and, as soon as traffic cleared, made a quick, illegal U-turn and sped up to catch Mulder’s car which was doing well under the speed limit as he waited for her. She saw him still grinning at her in the rearview mirror and let herself continue to smile in return, holding nothing back. When he sped up Scully did the same, pulling up to be beside him. Which she always had, and likely always would as they headed to their future.

finis


End file.
